Bentonville Health Care Campus Arkansas, Alice L. Walton Foundation AR interior design, American architecture images

Bentonville Health Care Campus

post updated January 8, 2026

Design: CannonDesign and EDSA

Location: Bentonville, Arkansas, United States of America

CannonDesign sketch of the wellness-inspired and nature-infused design of the future Bentonville Health Care Campus:

image courtesy CannonDesign

November 15, 2025

Bentonville Health Care Campus Building Design

Alice L. Walton Foundation announces the selection of global firms CannonDesign and EDSA to design a campus focused on whole health

Design vision for the future Bentonville Health Care Campus includes deep connections to nature.

BENTONVILLE, ARKANSAS (November 12, 2025) – The Alice L. Walton Foundation announced that global design firm CannonDesign and global planning, landscape architecture, and urban design firm EDSA have been selected to design its future Bentonville Health Care Campus.

In February 2025, the Foundation announced that the campus will be located on a 100-acre site approximately two miles east of downtown Bentonville. The creation of the campus follows an announcement of a 30-year, $700 million collaboration between the Foundation and Mercy to expand access to health care, working with Heartland Whole Health Institute to reduce costs and improve health outcomes in the Heartland. It also announced that Cleveland Clinic will collaborate, providing world-class cardiovascular expertise to the effort. Mercy’s experience and history in planning places of care and healing is shaping the building design on the Bentonville Health Care Campus, which will include a Center for Advanced Specialty Care, supporting the partnership and creating a transformative model of care.

Rendering of the proposed Center for Advanced Specialty Care on the future Bentonville Health Care Campus, Arkansas, USA:

image courtesy CannonDesign

“Our innovative partnership focused on bringing world-class specialty care to our region needs equally innovative design partners,” said founder and philanthropist Alice Walton. “I’m delighted to announce that CannonDesign and EDSA have been selected to design our future Bentonville Health Care Campus. They bring to this project an understanding of whole health and how our environment and interactions influence our health and well-being. They’ve coupled that understanding with admiration for the beauty of the Ozark region and the collaborative spirit of our community, and channeled it into designs that enhance accessibility, connection, and ultimately wellness.”

Render of the Center for Advanced Specialty Care on the Bentonville Health Care Campus, AR:

image courtesy CannonDesign

Design rooted in whole health care

The proposed design for the Bentonville Health Care Campus represents a departure from conventional health care offerings. Rather than a series of clinical buildings connected with parking lots, the campus is a fully integrated environment design focused on enhancing whole-person health – physical, mental, social and emotional well-being.

“We’re designing this campus through the lens of Living-Centered Design, which explores how places can help people live healthier lives and support stronger communities,” said PJ Glasco, Project Executive and Health Practice Leader at CannonDesign. “What the foundation is striving to achieve with this campus is extraordinary, as it addresses interconnected health needs at a scale few have ever attempted. Our team is thrilled to help bring this vision to life and demonstrate how design can directly shape healthier outcomes across the region.”

image courtesy CannonDesign

Nature, art, and architecture as active healers

An extensive landscape strategy choreographs movement through the site, turning every step into a restorative experience. At its edges, the campus opens to the community with welcoming green spaces that invite connection and comfort, while deeper within, a network of trails and pedestrian paths link contemplative areas designed for quiet retreat. Water serves as both a unifying feature of the landscape and a key part of the campus’s sustainability strategy. Stormwater is captured, cleansed, and reused—transformed into an amenity that expresses wellness through the natural rhythms of the Arkansas landscape.

“Every design decision is guided by ecological wellness and human experience,” says Gregg Sutton, EDSA Principal. “Through architecture, landscape, and art, we’re crafting spaces that feel alive, connect people to nature, and inspire healing. Materials like wood, stone, glass, and metal work in harmony with flowing water and curated art to create environments that support both physical and emotional well-being. The goal is for the campus to feel less like a place to ‘get treated’ and more like a place to live well.”

Interior of the proposed Center for Advanced Specialty Care will feature wood, glass, and other natural materials:

image courtesy CannonDesign

An ecosystem of health care transformation, based in Northwest Arkansas

The future Bentonville Health Care Campus is part of a larger ecosystem in Bentonville focused on tackling the health challenges faced by Northwest Arkansas and other communities across the country. Walton has also founded Heartland Whole Health Institute, which is focused on reforming care delivery and payment models that can be duplicated on this campus and across the country. Additionally, Alice L. Walton School of Medicine opened its doors to its first class of students in July 2025, educating the next generation of physicians with a curriculum that includes whole health principles, with Mercy serving as its primary teaching partner. Both organizations are located on the Crystal Bridges Campus, approximately two miles from the future Bentonville Health Care Campus.

The Foundation’s current work with CannonDesign and EDSA is focused on an initial phase to include the Center for Advanced Specialty Care, a parking garage, and a central utility building as well as extensive landscape, gardens, trails, and grounds. Arkansas-based Polk Stanley Wilcox Architects will work with CannonDesign as local architects of record; the firm’s recent work includes the Alice L. Walton School of Medicine building. Additional contractors include: Flintco Construction (Construction Manager); Nabholz (Large Scale Campus Development); and Walter P. Moore (Civil Engineering).

This initial phase is located in the north portion of the acreage, accessible through Central Avenue and McCollum Drive, and adjacent to Interstate 49. Initial plans propose opening this section in December 2028. More information will be shared as it becomes available.

image courtesy CannonDesign

+++

Alice L. Walton Foundation

Founded in 2017, the Alice L. Walton Foundation works to enhance the quality of life for individuals through providing access to offerings that improve well-being and create inclusive communities. The foundation focuses on philanthropist Alice Walton’s commitment to increasing access to the arts, improving education outcomes, enhancing health, and advancing economic opportunity for all. Through this work, the foundation strives to deliver meaningful and lasting change to individuals and communities most in need.

Learn more at Alice L. Walton Foundation

CannonDesign

CannonDesign is a global design firm repeatedly recognized by Fast Company as one of the world’s most innovative companies. At the heart of its work is Living-Centered Design — an approach that looks at how places can help people live healthier lives and support stronger communities. This philosophy has made CannonDesign a leader in designing future-forward social investments in healthcare, education and research, as well as other markets. The firm partners with today’s most transformative organizations, including Mercy, Cleveland Clinic, MD Anderson, Mayo Clinic, Disney, LinkedIn, Yale, Johns Hopkins University and NYU, among others. Learn more at www.cannondesign.com

EDSA

EDSA is a creative design firm of planners and landscape architects shaping places that inspire, connect, and restore. Guided by a philosophy of human-centered, nature-driven design, the firm transforms mixed-use campuses and healthcare environments into spaces that enhance wellbeing, foster community, and elevate everyday experience. By harmonizing nature, culture, and innovation, EDSA creates thoughtful environments that promote stewardship of the land and support quality of life for the communities they serve. Learn more at www.edsaplan.com

About Heartland Whole Health Institute

Founded in 2019 by philanthropist Alice Walton, Heartland Whole Health Institute
puts a whole health approach at the center of the broader health care system to address the current health care crisis. The vision is to advocate, educate, and guide the implementation of an innovative system, rooted in whole health and the realignment of financial incentives.

The Institute was driven by its founder’s health care experience and furthered by research revealing that the United States has one of the highest levels of health care spending worldwide yet relatively low rankings in overall health. In conjunction with Alice L. Walton School of Medicine, the Institute will transform health care by improving outcomes, reducing costs, and expanding access, beginning in the Heartland and scaling nationally.

About Mercy

Mercy,
, one of the 15 largest U.S. health systems and named the top large system in the U.S. for excellent patient experience by NRC Health, serves millions annually with nationally recognized care and one of the nation’s largest and highest performing Accountable Care Organizations in quality and cost. Mercy is a highly integrated, multi-state health care system including 55 acute care and specialty (heart, children’s, orthopedic and rehab) hospitals, convenient and urgent care locations, imaging centers and pharmacies.

Mercy has over 1,000 physician practice locations and outpatient facilities, more than 5,000 physicians and advanced practitioners and more than 50,000 caregivers serving patients and families across Arkansas, Illinois, Kansas, Missouri and Oklahoma. Mercy also has clinics, outpatient services and outreach ministries in Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas. In fiscal year 2025 alone, Mercy provided more than half a billion dollars of free care and other community benefits, including traditional charity care and unreimbursed Medicaid.

EDSA Landscape Architects

Bentonville Health Care Campus Building Design, AR images / information received 151125

Address: Bentonville, Arkansas 72712, United States of America.

+++